CHAPTER II.


The new home awaiting the family was situated in the south end of the city.
The house, which is still considered a desirable residence, was built in a
style very common in Halifax, for the accommodation of two tenants. The
owner, a Mr. Gurney, lived in one part of it; he was a native of England,
but at the solicitation of his brother, who was an officer in one of the
regiments, he had removed to Nova Scotia, and was doing a prosperous
business on Granville Street.

Mr. Gurney had a large family. Cora, the eldest, was just out of her teens;
then came Launcelot or Lancy, as he was usually called; then Elsie, and so
on, till you came to an infant in arms. As the cabs containing the Sherwood
family drove up to the house, the nursery windows in the second story of
the Gurney household were filled with childish faces, anxious to see what
sort of playmates their new neighbors might be; and when the young
strangers alighted on the sidewalk they observed the happy faces and smiled
back in return, thus pleasantly intimating that they hoped to be friends.
But when Dinah appeared with the baby, the faces in the window betrayed
their astonishment. "Oh! a black nurse! and the baby don't seem a bit
frightened of her!" they exclaimed in surprise.

"I wonder if they love her when she is so _very_ black," said little
Gracie. "I shouldn't love to kiss her, would you, Percy?" looking at their
own fair-faced nurse in loving approval.

Mrs. Sherwood was surprised to find the house so neatly and comfortably
arranged, but she soon learned that she was indebted to Mrs. Gurney for
this pleasant state of affairs, for she had given Mr. Sherwood much